Gabrielle Browne is Director of Marketing of Alpha Vet Technology.

Lives in Australia.

Comes every 6-8 weeks to Neuchâtel for continued development of the new product of Alpha Vet Tech, with regional innovation partners.

Can you tell me more about your business?

Alpha Vet Tech is an animal medical technology company dedicated to increasing the quality of animal healthcare worldwide. We have developed a pet wearable for the veterinary and animal healthcare industry. The pet wearable will monitor key vital signs such as : oxygen saturation, heart rate, temperature, ambient temperature every two seconds and is displayed on a dedicated cloud base platform. It will be a real game changer for the vet industry. Currently, the only way they can monitor the animals is when the animal is sedated or too sick to move.

The product was launched in London in November 2019 at the London Vet Show

Which competences in the canton of Neuchâtel are vital for your business?

We are collaborating and domiciling at Cloos Electronic. We partnered with Cloos as they have the expertise to further develop and micronize the electronics and we have the capabilities to develop a solid back end Cloud Based data platform. Their knowledge on sensors and cloud development is crucial to the current and future development of the device and platform. We wanted to build a device that was specific to pets rather than using existing human technologies. We built the device from the ground up. From initial engagement the process with Cloos has taken approximately 18 months.

The other collaboration we engaged was with Multiple Global Design. We were introduced to them by the canton of Neuchâtel. They have been very open to work with us about the design process from concept to manufacturing. Together, we have been very forward thinking in that sense because Multiple and Cloos have never done animal technology. It’s been a very good learning curve for them and for us.

How did you discover Neuchâtel?

I did not know much about the country of Switzerland before this collaboration. I knew the country had fabulous cheese, chocolate, skiing and luxury goods such as watches. We met a person working for Greater Geneva Bern area during a medical technology conference in San Diego where we spoke to the delegates about the pet wearable we were developing. He was sure we could find what we were looking for in the canton of Neuchâtel and he invited us to visit. It took us a year to get here but we were overwhelmed by what we saw. Our entire 3-5 year development plan for the product was already done at CSEM and other businesses around Neuchatel. The canton of Neuchâtel gave us the opportunity to develop the commercial product much faster : two years instead of ten years in Australia.

We love coming here. Neuchâtel is a very forward thinking canton. Switzerland has strict policies around the humane treatment of animals which was important to the business’ and our core value. The Swiss people considered us as part of the family, which is very important for us.